Leaders from Ontario’s Catholic trustees’ association meet with Education Minister Laurel Broten, just one day before the government is expected to pass Bill 13.

Gay Straight Alliance at Northern Secondary School gets a visit from Education Minister Laurel Broten in December the day after Premier McGuinty announced that anti-bullying legislation would be tabled. Broten (centre) and student Kit Muir (right), co-president of the school's Gay Straight Alliance, listen to comments from MPP Eric Hoskins. (Dec. 1, 2011)

Leaders from Ontario’s Catholic trustees’ association met with Education Minister Laurel Broten Monday — just one day before the government is to pass an anti-bullying bill they oppose.

Bill 13 contains an amendment that would force Catholic schools to allow gay-straight alliance groups if students request them and require principals to allow the word “gay” in the club name, something the Ontario Catholic School Trustees’ Association is vehemently against.

The controversy has revived public debate about $7 billion a year in public funding of Catholic schools.

Catholic opposition to the amendment has prompted the Green Party and other groups to push for a single, secular public school system that could save up to $1.5 billion annually by cutting waste and duplication.

“I understand that there are voices engaged in a dialogue but I want to be very clear . . . our government supports Catholic education,” Broten said before the trustee meeting.

The anti-bullying bill and the controversial amendment “has nothing to do with defunding Catholic education,” added Broten, a mother of twin boys in a Catholic school.

She said she is “confident” separate schools can follow the law if it is passed as expected with New Democrat support.

“Let me speak directly to parents who make the choice to have their kids in a Catholic school as I do. We are very, very firm in our commitment to Catholic education.”

Progressive Conservative Leader Tim Hudak has accused the minority Liberal government of trying to “pick a fight” with Catholics and undermine public support for their school funding.

NDP Leader Andrea Horwath said her party supports Catholic school funding and warns any broader public debate about scrapping the funding away would be “messy.”

But she maintained Catholic schools need to get on board with the gay naming amendment.

“It has to be pretty clear that publicly funded education systems need to follow the same rules. They need to respect young peoples’ rights in the same way,” Horwath said. “That’s what I believe the bill is intended to do.”

Regardless of the assurances from Broten, Catholic trustees have been unnerved by the push from the Green Party and others for a single public school system.

“In light of the passage of Bill 13 (expected on Tuesday), it is important to have a unified response to the key issues,” says a document, written by executive director Kevin Kobus and obtained by the Toronto Star.

Despite statements that court action was being considered by some in the Catholic community, Kobus suggests that “it is not the intent of OCSTA to initiate a legal challenge.”

It also says that principals should allow students to start gay-straight alliances “if such a request is made. This does not, however, remove the right of a principal to ensure the appropriateness of materials used in the school.”

The document also questions the Ontario government’s commitment to Catholic schools despite what it says publicly.

“There are enough indicators to show that this government’s support for Catholic schools is questionable,” says the report. “The minister, however has been consistent in saying that the defunding of Catholic schools is not on the table. Time will tell.”

The report notes that the bill will pass this Tuesday and “the objectionable amendment regarding the requirement to allow the name ‘gay straight alliance’ will be part of the bill.”

A memo included in the report from Dufferin-Peel Catholic District School Board trustees — the board that was ground zero for the gay-straight alliance debate, after a student publicly challenged her principal’s decision to ban such clubs — says a “clear victory” would be needed if there was to be a court challenge.

It also says that Catholic schools have lost the public relations battle on this issue, and acknowledges that “those who opposed Catholic education have been able to rally around this issue . . . using it as an opportunity to attack Catholic education.”

Earlier, Marino Gazzola, chair of the Ontario Catholic School Trustees’ Association, said that using the word “gay” in the name of supportive clubs is going too far under Ontario’s proposed new anti-bullying law. “In our view the word itself is a distraction.”

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